


Every New Beginning

by chantefable



Category: Frontier Wolf - Rosemary Sutcliff
Genre: Arranged Marriage, Gen, M/M, Murder, Oblivious Bard, One Night Stands, Political Alliances, Pre-Canon, Suspense
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-21
Updated: 2018-03-21
Packaged: 2019-04-06 06:08:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,107
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14050593
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chantefable/pseuds/chantefable
Summary: Political marriages shape tribal alliances, spies secure alibis and perform dastardly deeds, and one wandering harper just wants to make some money for mead and gambling.It can hardly end well, can it?





	Every New Beginning

**Author's Note:**

  * For [fawatson](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fawatson/gifts).



> “Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end.” - Seneca the Elder

“Say not always what you know, but always know what you say.”  
Claudius

“There are times, you know, when travel's a bad idea.”  
Sulpicia

***

  
  


The day teetered on the edge between light and dark, and I was chilled to the bone and keen on neither.

The path was barely etched into the green bosom of the earth, and my step was firm only because I remembered the way. I had been to the place as recently as last summer, when Cottia the raider gave her son away in marriage. I should be a fool to forget the path to the village where they had given me a fine horse as payment for my trouble.

Then again, I had gambled the mare away by midwinter, so maybe I am a fool.

I hurried as much as I could. The grass blades were long and cool with dew, licking at my bare ankles, and I strained my eyes, watching the curves and slopes of the low hills, trying to put together words that would match the rhythm of my footfalls. Curves and dew, green and blue, something long, and fluid, and endless – a nice song of affection, affinity and good things to come. Those pay well. But my breeches were damp and my belly was empty, and it is damn hard to find nice things to say about the world when you are in a state like that.

My neck prickled uncomfortably on occasion, and since it had to be either a mean sprite or a fox stalking me, I muttered a prayer to Lugh and did not look back.

Soon I was standing tall on top of yet another hill, the village faintly visible in the distance, and gazed at the sunset, bleeding red along the edge of the horizon, instead of making haste and taking advantage of the remaining light to get to my destination safely. Naturally, this was the moment my stomach chose to growl in distaste.

In my defense, all that my poor stomach had seen that day had been a slice of bread and a palmful of fresh cheese shared by the young cheese-maker's apprentice who had been my fellow traveller. Being probably twenty summers younger than me, the boy had long hurried forth. And, burdened as he had been with two large sacks heavy with ripe cheeses, I was sure that he had long reached the village and was now warm by the merry fire, making good trade for his master. I, on the other hand, was cold and slow and about to be making my way in the dark, the stench of hard, maggoty cheese a welcome memory.

Before I could curse aloud about my bard's life, a slight shift in the air announced a foreign presence. For a brief moment, I was convinced it was the fox from before, and an unnatural fear seized my throat even as the last rays of the sun drew fiery lines above the trees. But then I turned, and a man greeted me.

He was very average-looking, almost mousy, and as we exchanged words, I was sure that I had seen him before. Perhaps at Traprain Law, perhaps elsewhere. But he did not volunteer much when I introduced myself, and so I did not share my insight, either. He shared some dry berries with me, and seemed friendly and chatty enough as we walked together downhill, easily asking what my business was and what I thought of the wedding. Twilight was slowly swallowing us, and I was certain that he did not look like a man of the Votadini. Then again, he did not look much like one of the Selgovae, either. Perhaps he was of the Damnonii. Somehow, in that moment I thought it was impolite to ask, and then I forgot.

The village looked festive even from afar, tree trunks and lower edges of the roundhouses painted white with lime, white shields on display, and white cloths left hanging. I would have bid my companion farewell, but he insisted on accompanying me to Cuscrid's house, where I was expected to stay, and I could hardly say no. There were children scurrying underfoot despite the late hour, and the air was thick with rich smells of fresh bread, greasy meat, and pungent cheese. Tuan, the young cheesemaker, must have found customers for his smelly delights already.

Cuscrid's shield-brother saw me first, and rushed to greet me with more fervour than I thought our acquaintance merited. Then again, given how much I had lost to him last time at latrunculi, that blasted Roman game, I should think his gladness was that of a ferret spotting a fat hen. Lugh be my witness, he was hardly wrong to think that; I may earn my living by spinning a thousand woeful tales of sunsets and maidens' braids, but I am no stranger to more base lusts. Quite the opposite.

Then Cuscrid came, as golden-haired as when we had been boys. Naturally, jealousy urged me to say something spiteful, but I stifled the words, resolving to make a herb brew and apply it to my temples that very night. Introductions were made, and if Cuscrid and his shield-brother made assumptions, one could have hardly blamed them, for my companion was far more cordial and at ease than the short nature of our acquaintance would have suggested. Some people just have that easy manner about them. I thought little of it in the moment, distracted by the clamour, the joy of reunion, and the cup of mead being shoved into my hand.

I took a hearty sip. The taste filled my mouth, the mead clearly last year's if not older, and watered down with mocking generosity. I let it slosh and drag through my teeth, for I could feel eyes on me and there is no such thing as discreet spitting with a watchful witness present. Sometimes, honour demands that you swallow.

I should put this line in a song sometime. It would do wonderfully for the bawdy month of May.

At last we bid each other farewell amidst mutual assurances of goodwill and excitement about the upcoming wedding, and how wonderful it was that of all the Attacotti villages, this one was chosen to welcome the Votadini groom and the bride from Erin. My new blue-eyed friend went on his way, and Cuscrid and his shield-brother were called to help straighten the quarters set up for the formal matchmakers due to arrive the next day. I went into the roundhouse, and languor came over me like a spell. Placing my carefully wrapped harp in my line of sight, I crawled under the blanket in the corner and closed my eyes, thinking that the long, fluid, dewy words from earlier would do wonderfully for the song hailing Eirinn of the Attacotti, her red tresses, warlike spirit, and youthful cheeks. Sure, I only remembered seeing her years ago when she was a few months old, but those were good words to describe a noble bride about to enter a great alliance. They fit the rhymes I had put together very well. Soon, sleep claimed me.

I dreamed of the fox's gaping maw, and hair undulating like waves or sea snakes. A burst of red against a white shield. Dice being cast, and a board shattered like the future.

Oh, how I know that I should drink and gamble less, but it is far too late to start on the prudent path. And alas, that night my dark mead-tinged dreams were dreadfully close to reality.

I woke up with a start, instinctively reaching for my precious harp, but it was safe, within reach. I tried to shake off the lingering impressions of my heavy dream, those broken pieces and circles opening and closing; they made little sense, like dreams do. The feeling of being watched was real, though. The roaring in my ears eased into mere patter of rain against the roof. My eyes adjusted to the darkness, and instead of Cuscrid or his shield-brother, I saw my blue-eyed friend. 

He did not look mousy in the shadows. It cut me to the quick how wrong I was, for I had never seen a man look less average. I thought his face looked open as day, shining white like the moon. He was a song, and its rhythm was as furiously fast as my heartbeat.

His eyelids slid half-closed in slow motion, and I watched the raindrops glimmer on his skin.

I did not question why he had come. Instead, I drew him to me and learned the pounding of blood under the skin of his wrists, the icy touch of his hands – as if he had plunged them in cold water instead of merely getting wet in the rain – the taste of his mouth.

Once more, it was dark.

I awoke alone the next morning, wistful rather than bitter about the absence of my companion. My harp was just where I had left it, so I thought that everything must be fine. 

Then I heard the shout, and knew that I was wrong.

Someone had slain young Eirinn in the night, strangled her with her own braid and slit her throat. There was red on her dress, and on her ghastly white skin, and on the clothes of her two shield-maidens, somehow rendered unconscious but left alive, crumpled on the ground floor as the blood of their mistress soaked through their tunics and seeped into their hair. So much red, everywhere. 

Who could have done such a terrible deed?

The Attacotti stumbled about the village, grief and rage and shame spread across their faces, as stark as ritual paint. There was no bride for young Cunorix of the Votadini to marry. There was no great alliance to be celebrated. 

There was no Eirinn of Erin, daughter of the elected king of the Attacotti. She had lived through childhood illness, hunted wild beasts, travelled across the sea, and was killed on the eve of finally meeting her chosen suitor, the elder son of the Votadini chieftain Ferradach Dhu. They would hear of it from the Glen of the Red Horse to the Glen of the Alderwoods, across Caledonia and Erin: this should have been the place for a new beginning. This was the place of ruin and murder.

Who could have done such a horrible deed?

They searched far and wide. They asked and they raged. But no one knew anything, and everyone was accounted for. Everyone could vouch for everyone, even strangers; everyone knew where everyone else had been during the night.

They raged and they wondered. It was not a time for songs until it was, and I sang a lament to young Eirinn as they put her on the funeral pyre. Her uncle, who had come as her guardian, wept in the arms of Ferradach Dhu. Young Cunorix, scarcely more than a boy, looked lost and bereft. That was how he saw his luckless bride for the first and last time: with the braid that had killed her piled like a crown upon her head.

After that, I left.

They had paid me handsomely for the song of young Eirinn, but the money all but burned a hole in my sack, and I was eager to spend it or lose it. Anything would do, even a market day at Castellum. As I made my way through the low hills once more, I felt filthy and ashamed for no reason I could understand. 

It was horrifying that someone could have slaughtered the girl like that. No one knew who, and no one knew why. Just like the mysteries of sunrise and moonrise, there was no proof – but there were reasonable assumptions.

For there had been much to be gained from a match between the Attacotti and the Votadini, and there were those who might have been opposed to that. Who would have dared? The Caledones? The Dalriads? The Dumnonii?

The Romans?

Who, indeed.

Just like the mysteries of sunrise and moonrise, there was no proof – but as I hastened to put as much distance between myself and the damned Attacotti village as possible, I was almost sure that I remembered where I had met my mousy friend before. And I was almost sure that, should we ever meet again, he would have yet another name and another purpose. 

I could only hope that next time, I would recognise him fast enough – and live long enough to get away. But of course, as a gambling man, I knew hope was of little value. I clutched my harp tighter and ran.

**Author's Note:**

> Marcus Annaeus Seneca (54 BC – 39 AD), Roman philosopher, writer and rhetorician, witnessed the reigns of Augustus, Tiberius, and Caligula.
> 
> Tiberius Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus (10 BC – 54 AD), Rome's first ruler born outside of Italy, reigned from 41 AD to 54 AD.
> 
> Sulpicia (40 BC? - ?), Roman poet in the reign of Augustus, daughter of Servius Sulpicius Rufus, orator and jurist; niece and ward of Messalla Corvinus, noted patron of literature. Quoted in the [Lee Pearcy translation](http://www.stoa.org/diotima/anthology/sulpicia-anth.shtml).


End file.
